Books like

Books like Long Way Down

12 books with a reading profile close to Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds. Inward-looking and thought-provoking; an easy read.

1

This One Summer

by Mariko Tamaki

Also inward-looking · narrative, accessible

Rose and Wind are childhood friends who reunite every July at a lakeside cabin in Awago Beach.
2

American Born Chinese

by Gene Luen Yang

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

Gene Luen Yang weaves together three distinct narrative threads to examine the internal conflicts of cultural assimilation.
3

The Spectacular Now

by Tim Tharp

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

Sutter Keely is a high school senior in a small Oklahoma town who lives for parties and drinking and thinks of himself as the life of every gathering.
4

Signal Fires

by Dani Shapiro

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

Two families, the Wilfs and the Shenkmans, live as neighbors in a Connecticut town.
5

Love Letters to the Dead

by Ava Dellaira

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

When Laurel’s English teacher assigns a letter to a deceased person, the high school freshman begins a secret journal addressed to figures like Kurt Cobain, Janis Joplin, and Amy Winehouse.
6

Clap When You Land

by Elizabeth Acevedo

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

Twin sisters Camino and Yahaira Rios live separate lives in the Dominican Republic and New York City, unaware of each other’s existence.
7

Prep

by Curtis Sittenfeld

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

Lee Fiora, a girl from a modest family in Indiana, wins a scholarship to the Ault School, a prestigious boarding school in Massachusetts.
8

Jacob Have I Loved

by Katherine Paterson

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

Set on the isolated island of Rass in the Chesapeake Bay during the 1940s, the story follows Louise Bradshaw’s struggle to find an identity separate from her twin sister, Caroline.
9

Tom Lake

by Ann Patchett

Also inward-looking and thought-provoking · narrative, accessible

During the 2020 pandemic, Lara gathers with her three adult daughters on their family cherry orchard in Michigan.
10

The Immortalists

by Chloe Benjamin

Also inward-looking · narrative, accessible

In 1969 New York, the four Gold siblings—Varya, Daniel, Klara, and Simon—visit a psychic who predicts the exact date each will die.
11

Interesting Facts about Space

by Emily R. Austin

Also inward-looking · narrative, accessible

Enid Hoffman is a deaf woman who manages her chronic anxiety through a fixation on space trivia and a compulsive habit of monitoring local crime reports.
12

The Language of Flowers

by Vanessa Diffenbaugh

Also inward-looking · narrative, accessible

Victoria Jones ages out of the California foster care system with no resources and a history of failed placements.

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